Now that its installed, I see why no response. Holy moly is that install tough. I decided against spending too many hours removing the canon, ramps, diverter, band and on and on.

I ended up cutting the protector in the areas marked. This allowed enough clearance to slip the protector over the canon using the prepunched sling holes. Up top cuts allowed me to simply slide those strips along the orbits without removing anything. On bottom, I removed slings, ball guides and flippers ... also loosened the ramps by removing the hex support on each. Only other thing was to unplug the left flasher under the PF, pull the plug to top of PF and run back down thru protector slot cut for left sling.

Took about an hour all in. Played 10+ games and no ball hangs due to cuts. Note that some cuts were made at angle. Purposefull to support ball movement.

I have done them on Stern Star Wars and Stern Batman66. It takes 1.5-2.5 hours but is well worth the effort. If you use the ones from Germany, MAKE SURE ALL SURFACES ARE CLEAN AND DRY. Otherwise you will get mottling like crazy.

I have done them on Stern Star Wars and Stern Batman66. It takes 1.5-2.5 hours but is well worth the effort. If you use the ones from Germany, MAKE SURE ALL SURFACES ARE CLEAN AND DRY. Otherwise you will get mottling like crazy.

I have done them on Stern Star Wars and Stern Batman66. It takes 1.5-2.5 hours but is well worth the effort. If you use the ones from Germany, MAKE SURE ALL SURFACES ARE CLEAN AND DRY. Otherwise you will get mottling like crazy.

Agreed on all ... I put one on Big Betty's Truck Stop and my BM66SLE and it took about that long as well. The BM was a little more involved as I helped the guys in Germany in design of the first BM66 and had to do some tweaking.

I love these things for a ton of reasons ... keeps a virgin PF in very good shape. Dramatically cuts dimpling. Creates a very high gloss PF look.
If you ever don't like it - take it out in minutes

You can see in the images where I made some of my "cheater" cuts - no harm at all so far after maybe 30 games

This - mine appears to be caused by waxing the PF first - seems like the protector bonds with that wax and almost looks like water has gotten under it.
I did not wax AC/DC before adding the protector and I do not have any mottling. I have pulled the protector up on BM66 to check out the impact and there is absolutely nothing you can see or feel in the spot that "shows" when you lay the protector back down! I also did not have this issue on my BBTS (and I did NOT wax that one first either). Guessing it's the wax and also am pretty sure it's benign.

This - mine appears to be caused by waxing the PF first - seems like the protector bonds with that wax and almost looks like water has gotten under it.
I did not wax AC/DC before adding the protector and I do not have any mottling. I have pulled the protector up on BM66 to check out the impact and there is absolutely nothing you can see or feel in the spot that "shows" when you lay the protector back down! I also did not have this issue on my BBTS (and I did NOT wax that one first either). Guessing it's the wax and also am pretty sure it's benign.

Did you clean the playfield with anything before putting the protector down? i.e. dirty playfield under protector...

I have played the game maybe 100 games since installing with the "cheating-cuts" and no ball hangups whatsoever EXCEPT at the drop target areas and I am not sure if the ball would hang there once in a while anyway without the protector on. Those hang ups are not often (as in not every game) but they do happen frequently. Would love to hear comments from others with AC/DC but without the protector to see if they have ball hangups in those areas. Hope that helps

Not quite sure the question but I will take a shot ...
I have played the game maybe 100 games since installing with the "cheating-cuts" and no ball hangups whatsoever EXCEPT at the drop target areas and I am not sure if the ball would hang there once in a while anyway without the protector on. Those hang ups are not often (as in not every game) but they do happen frequently. Would love to hear comments from others with AC/DC but without the protector to see if they have ball hangups in those areas. Hope that helps

With years of playing and thousands of games on it, I've never had a hang up near the drops.

It does, I did and it did ... mottled that is.
I did not wax my new AC/DC Premium Vault before putting down the protector and have zero mottling.

It will happen eventually,
9 of 11 of the ones I installed have little here and there. Some don't have any for a while, then it appears after X amount of plays. Think it has to do with the clear coat and how new the game is. the two older games I installed it on don't have that issue anywhere.
Personally it's a small price to pay to not have to worry about the playfield getting beat to shit.
Especially on location.
I wouldn't wax first either, I'm pretty sure it won't help the situation.
If it is still clear after 2 months let me know, because obviously I'm doing something wrong.

Probably because they can be a big pain in the ass to install on newer games, older games are usually pretty easy.
Most people don't even know how to rebuild the flipper assemblies. The smaller % of people willing to tackle a project like this, probably don't think it's worth it.

t will happen eventually,
9 of 11 of the ones I installed have little here and there. Some don't have any for a while, then it appears after X amount of plays. Think it has to do with the clear coat and how new the game is. the two older games I installed it on don't have that issue anywhere.
Personally it's a small price to pay to not have to worry about the playfield getting beat to shit.
Especially on location.
I wouldn't wax first either, I'm pretty sure it won't help the situation.
If it is still clear after 2 months let me know, because obviously I'm doing something wrong.

Just started to see some mottling on the AC/DC install - again, this is one where I did NOT wax beforehand ... so it looks like wax or no wax, it can still show up. For now it's very minor. I'm in the same boat in that I will live with the mottling as it's a small price to pay for the protection

Just started to see some mottling on the AC/DC install - again, this is one where I did NOT wax beforehand ... so it looks like wax or no wax, it can still show up. For now it's very minor. I'm in the same boat in that I will live with the mottling as it's a small price to pay for the protection

Mottling Pics please. I was thinking of putting one on my STLE. question: can these protectors go over “Cliffy protectors”.
I would be nervous taking the cliffies off if they are in good shape.

Just started to see some mottling on the AC/DC install - again, this is one where I did NOT wax beforehand ... so it looks like wax or no wax, it can still show up. For now it's very minor. I'm in the same boat in that I will live with the mottling as it's a small price to pay for the protection

yup definitely worth it especially with the wood quality stern is going with these days. I don't claim to be an expert on pine, cedar, spruce, and redwood or whatever plywood playfields are made of these days, but I do know that there are different grades of wood. If the tree is "slow grown" pine it's higher quality and much harder then say "fast grown" pine. Guess this is the reason for playfield looking the way they do after being played to death.

All that talk about you won't notice the dimples after a while, because it will all be dimpled is b.s.. that might of been true back in the day, but now... one pic is of a routed 2000 sharkeys shootout & the other is of a 2017 starwars. there is one at a location near me that is on free play that looks similar to this pic I found. Both have been played more then most people would ever play in their homes in a lifetime. Does that SW look normal to you?
They also have a 2016 ghostbusters that looks much much worse (playfield dimpling wise).
When the proof is right there it's hard to say different. Stern is using cheaper softer wood that accentuates the dings/dimples a lot more then it used to.

if your going with any other manufacture, this doesn't seem to be an issue. I had the shooter lane get torn up within 50 plays on AC/DC, the GOT drain clearcoat chipped right off. That being said the majority of my collection is stern, just wish they would go with the higher quality stuff. For now all you can do is add protectors, mylar and/or cliffys.

Not that I have seen BUT ... the easiest thing to do would be to cut a piece of your own mylar to size. Wax the PF first so you could/can remove it later without damaging artwork. Make a paper template first, then cut the mylar and install.

You could also buy some raw PETG from Amazon like I did and make just a piece sized for the center but it would then need to be taped on the edges with mylar anyway. The way a full PF protector stays in place is that it can move slightly L/R and up and down but because it hits something in each direction, it essentially stays in place where you want it. Just a center piece would move all over the place.

Another option is to buy a full size protector and cut the "hard to install part" off (the top part). You'll just need a few small pieces of mylar at the top (cut) edges to keep those from popping up and the ball going underneath

Below are my threads on playfield protectors - see post #309 on the BM66 thread on where you can purchase the PETG on Amazon and how I built one for my BM66SLE and only built it for 2/3rds of the PF. I eventually replaced it with the full version from the folks in Germany because I helped them design their final version - not because my shortened version did not work well - it did.

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